Joseph Bentz - Pieces of Heaven

This is a book for anyone who has ever asked, God, are you there? Joseph Bentz helps us turn the question around so that the question becomes a declaration: God, you are everywhere!

Dean Nelson

Professor, Point Loma Nazarene University

Author of God Hides in Plain Sight:

How to See the Sacred in a Chaotic World

Joseph Bentz has a gift for seeing the Holy Spirit in ordinary places. Let this book open your eyes to the God who is at work all around you.

Lawrence W. Wilson

Author of When Life Doesnt Turn Out the Way You Expect and
Why Me? Straight Talk about Suffering

Joseph Bentz is right sometimes its hard to recognize the presence of God. In his insightful book, Joseph Bentz peels back the mystery surrounding why we overlook Gods presence in our life, and more importantly, how we can recognize it. This book is a must for everyone whos ever longed to experience more of God.

Donna Jones

Pastors wife, national speaker

Author of Seek: A Womans Guide to Meeting God

Copyright 2012

By Joseph Bentz and Beacon Hill Press of Kansas City

2012 eISBN 978-0-8341-2965-8

Printed in the
United States of America

Cover Design: Arthur Cherry
Inside Design: Sharon Page

All Scripture quotations not otherwise designated are from The Holy Bible, New International Version (NIV 2011). Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Scripture quotations from the following additional copyrighted version of the Bible is acknowledged with appreciation:

The Holy Bible, English Standard Version (ESV). Copyright 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers.

Scripture quotations marked KJV are from the King James Version of the Bible.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Bentz, Joseph, 1961
Pieces of heaven : recognizing the presence of God / Joseph Bentz.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 978-0-8341-2886-6 (pbk.)
1. Presence of God. 2. GodKnowableness. 3. God (Christianity)Omnipresence. I. Title.
BT180.P6B46 2012
248.2dc23

2012020368

CONTENTS

God doesnt behave the way I wish He would.

Even though Ive been a Christian for many years, I still have a hard time explaining to someone who is not a believer why I cant help but be a follower of Jesus Christ. Its not that I lack the words to describe the doctrine or to tell the story of how God got hold of me. But how do I describe Gods powerful but invisible presence that keeps pulling me toward Him?

It would be easier if God chose to be more visible and obvious about how He inserts himself into peoples lives. I would love to be able to say, I am a Christian because God appeared above my house in the form of a radiant fireball and summoned me outside. In view of all my neighbors, who recorded the whole thing, He declared (in a booming voice, of course) that Jesus Christ is the way to salvation and that I should follow Him.

When Hollywood portrays God, they often do it in this more readily grasped, visual way. Who comes to mind when you think of a Hollywood-created God? A kindly, cigar-smoking George Burns? The wise and unflappable Morgan Freeman? Or maybe you prefer it when the special effects kick in and you get something like the God of Raiders of the Lost Ark.

Do you remember how the presence of God is portrayed in that movie? The Nazis want the ark of the covenant because they think they can use the power of Gods presence in it for their own evil purposes. When they finally get the ark, they lift up the lid and watch as bright white waves of smoke rise up from the box. The light swirls round and round, dozens of ribbons of it flying high in the air, with awe-inspiring beauty and power. Then majestic columns of fire rise from the ark and extend high into the air. The Nazis are triumphant.

But then, because God is apparently smart enough to know that these guys are Nazis and therefore bad guys, the whole scene turns ugly for them. The fire forms into huge daggers that stab right through the center of the soldiers bodies and kill them.

But that punishment is only for the low-ranking Nazi soldiers. The top Nazis suffer an even worse fate. The heads of the two leaders begin to melt, and they scream in pain. As if that were not gruesome enough, the head of the most villainous, whiny-voiced Nazi leader explodes in blood and gore like a smashed watermelon. Then all the fire and smoke come together in one gigantic column that shoots high above the island. Finally it collapses back down into the ark with a tremendous slam of the lid.

Beautiful. Smoke and fire and melting heads. That may not fit everyones concept of Gods presence, but at least its something people can see and understand.

In my own life, the Holy Spirit doesnt work that way. He is not flash and spectacle. He is not a booming voice. Nor is He a crusty but affable old man. He is not anything a Hollywood camera could capture.

He is a loving, abiding presence. More than anything else, I am a Christian because of Gods powerful, pursuing Spirit. As Romans 8:16 says, The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are Gods children. I can also discuss my faith in terms of doctrine and theology and biblical principles, but Gods presence is what keeps me tied to the faith even through crises of doubt, discouragement, and my own failures. How can I describe that presence? Its the most important part of my faith, but its also the hardest to talk about and the easiest for skeptics to dismiss.

The idea for this book was sparked by an overheard conversation about the presence of God. It was a simple moment, but I couldnt get it out of my mind. As my friends in the Christian writers group that was meeting in my home were getting ready to leave, I walked into the kitchen to hear one of our members, Lynn, speaking to another member of the group. She was describing a recent worship service she had been part of in which the people powerfully sensed the presence of the Holy Spirit. She said it was one of those times when the veil between us and eternity seemed very thin and almost disappeared. I can still picture the way she held her palms together as she said this, as if she were touching this thin, almost transparent barrier that she was describing.

That thin place in the veil is what this book is about.

God is always with us, I believe, but often the barriers are so thickbecause of noise, disbelief, indifference, daily responsibilities, and other distractionsthat we find ourselves paying little attention to Him. He is easy to ignore. Popular entertainment mocks Him, the political world is wary of Him, much of the intellectual elite denies Him, and a frenzied online social media loses Him in a flurry of trivia. Its easy to leave God out of our conversations and thoughtsat work, at school, in social settings, and unfortunately sometimes even at church. How can we open our eyes to His presence?

This book will consider God in the ordinary and God in the extraordinary. In the ordinary His Spirit is powerfully present in music, in nature, in the intellect, in prayer, and in Scripture. We may find Gods presence in our relationships, not only with those we love but also in those who cause us problems.

In the extraordinary He also manifests himself at rare times in more unusual ways, in powerful revivals, in peoples encounters with angels, or in the moments before death.